Things that should be fixed before M:TW is released... [Archive]

JRock

07-01-2002, 21:58

1 - Allow other siege soldiers to fill in the depleted ranks of siege engines with "too few men left to work".

It's frustrating and unrealistic seeing one catapult with plenty of ammo but only 3 men left when next to it is another catapult that is out of ammo and has 9 men standing around doing nothing. I should be able to direct those 9 men to go fill in the ranks of the depleted catapult unit so it can resume firing.

2 - The "Mystery Arrows" that seem to strike at my soldiers no matter how far away from all Arrow Towers I am. It's annoying having invisible arrows shot at my troops from no possible location except a stretch of empty walls with no towers, not to mention my troops are a good third of a mile away or more.

At the very least give us some sort of visual representation of who is shooting these arrows so we can figure out where they are coming from, oh and Make the Arrows Visible. Can't even see them at 1024x768 even though the ones in Shogun show up fine.

3 - Is there a way to re-pack a siege weapon to move it? You should be able to re-pack a ballista/catapult/etc and move it somewhere else. It should just take a long time.

Because I swear in the demo one of the instructions says, "Be careful where you place your siege weapons so that they will be effective," but when I loaded the mission THEY WERE ALREADY PLACED. And they were placed WITHIN range of the Mystery Arrows so it was frustrating.

Other than those three concerns, it is a great demo!

Also, something I thought I wouldn't have to even mention, but might as well JUST IN CASE -

We will OF COURSE be able to bind units and groups to the number keys like in every other RTS game, right???

What I mean is the basic ability that has been in RTS games since at least as early as 1995 which is the ability to select a unit or group, hit CTRL+number and from then on you just have to click on that number key and it will allow you to select that unit.

If the number keys are already taken up by formation controls, just allow us to re-bind formation controls to other things or make the formation controls ALT+number key.

It is common practice in strategy games to use the number keys for selecting units you have bound to them.

Thanks, and I wish the team the best in making this game the best it can be and getting it to the store shelves ASAP. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

[This message has been edited by JRock (edited 07-01-2002).]

theforce

07-01-2002, 22:17

You are correct mate.
I hate that my mean are under fire when l destroyed all archer towers in that area. Also l would like the other crue of the ballistic unit to take over a siege enging with ammo but lacks men to operate it!
About 3 l am sure you shall choose the location of the ballista. Wise placement of those can make the difference. Also u can set traps with them to lure enemies there.
Also rushing won't be so nice. A low trajectory shot(if physics are correct) won't be powerful but lt will roll with enough power to go through one unit( remember Joah of the Arch?)

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I cannot return l presume so l will keep my name among those who are dead by bows!

Nelson

07-01-2002, 22:36

Bouncing projectiles seem to be as destructive to buildings and walls when ricocheting as when striking stiking directly. At Acre I can fire at troops, hit them, and see the shot carom into a back wall and smash it. I don't think ricochets should harm walls and towers that much.

Hirosito

07-02-2002, 03:13

i don't think you'll get that last wish Jrock. about the other ones i agree, espwecially the depleted crew one. it's so frustrating

------------------
Hirosito Mori

Gentile or Jew
O you who turn the wheel and look to windward,
Consider Phlebas, who was once handsome and tall as you.

JRock

07-02-2002, 03:24

The last wish being the ability to bind units and groups to keys, or the ability to re-pack and move a siege weapon?

vyanvotts

07-02-2002, 03:53

the mystery arrows you are reffering to come directly from the ramparts of the wall, i have zoomed in on 640x480 resoloution and there are clearly arrows coming from the wall, it looks kinda stupid coming from no where and totally defeats the point of arrow towers, however men did stand on the wals and shoot arrows too.

Sjakihata

07-02-2002, 06:22

I am certain you can bind units to keys..

Press: SHIFT + CTRL + NUMBER (1-0).

Select by pressing: CTRL + NUMBER (1-0).

Like Shogun mate..

The other points are true though http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

Khan7

07-02-2002, 06:29

Really you shouldn't be able to pack and move your siege engine. Tactically mobile artillery did not appear until the 16th century, with King Gustav and bronze cannon.

Matt

Emp. Conralius

07-02-2002, 06:37

Doesn't it bother anyone when the shacks, houses, and mosques seem to shrink when they are destroyed? And it's very bothersome when you can't use an essential piece of artillery because too many of your crew cought some arrows!

JRock

07-02-2002, 09:10

Quote Originally posted by Khan7:
Really you shouldn't be able to pack and move your siege engine. Tactically mobile artillery did not appear until the 16th century, with King Gustav and bronze cannon.

Matt[/QUOTE]

Uhm, they got the siege engine there somehow, that would mean they could move it somewhere else as well. I'm not saying the thing should just pick itself up and move, I'm saying there should be a delay while the troops pack it up, then you can slowly move it somewhere, and then slowly build it or unpack it again. It's logical and it's realistic. It should be a part of the game.

JRock

07-02-2002, 09:15

Quote Originally posted by Sjakihata Akechi:
I am certain you can bind units to keys..

Press: SHIFT + CTRL + NUMBER (1-0).

Select by pressing: CTRL + NUMBER (1-0).

Like Shogun mate..

The other points are true though http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif[/QUOTE]

Really?? Awesome! I thought I tried every combination of keys to get that working, but I never thought to try CTRL+SHIFT+#. I tried CTRL, ALT, SHIft, and CTRL+ALT but never thought to try SHIFT+CTRL. LOL

Hirosito

07-02-2002, 16:40

i think immobile arty makes for interesting strategic options.

Sjakihata

07-02-2002, 18:54

Np Jrock... I think some catapults should be movable, not trebucets though http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif

JRock

07-02-2002, 20:07

Quote Originally posted by Sjakihata Akechi:
Np Jrock... I think some catapults should be movable, not trebucets though http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif[/QUOTE]

Ah good point, yes, the catapults, not necessarily the trebuchets!

TosaInu

07-02-2002, 20:45

Konnichiwa,

Catapults used in MTW are small devices made of wood, have a crew of some 12 men, and wheels. These must be movable (about 50% of infantry walkspeed or slower).

Trebuchets and siege cannons are not mobile.

Apart from that: siege equipment should not occupy any of the normal 16 unitslots. The defender is given a castle together with 16 units. The defender should receive 16 units and siege equipment. It will still be very hard to conquer a castle as you normally need a huge advantage to assault a castle.

------------------
Ja mata
Toda MizuTosaInu
Daimyo Takiyama Shi

http://www.takiyama.cjb.net

Hirosito

07-02-2002, 21:22

however the siege engines are very powerful they can make a few holes into the walls destroy arrow towers and still have ammo left to target troops.

------------------
Hirosito Mori

Gentile or Jew
O you who turn the wheel and look to windward,
Consider Phlebas, who was once handsome and tall as you.

DrNo

07-02-2002, 22:20

TosaInu,
Hirosito posted this in the Edit forum:

in the MTW folder go to frontend_files\armyselect there you will see 2 files one called '16 unit panel.BIF' the other more interestingly '22 unit panel.BIF'

It may just be that for siege battles the attacker gets 22 units. No real evidence of this but a possibility. Plus there is always the reinforcement option.

i.e. you attack with 24 units 8 of them siege. You field the 8 siege units plus 8 units to look after them. Once the walls are down retreat the siege units and bring on the rest of you army.
I used to use my archer units to some effect like this in STW, but you couldn't choose the order of reinforcements like MTW will allow. I can see this being used to much success against the AI.

JRock, it may be possible that siege units were made none moveable in demo to restrict graphics etc.. needed, and keep the demo software size to reasonable level.

Darkmoor, got any answers to this?

JRock

07-03-2002, 03:53

Yes it would really be nice to hear from Darkmoor Dragon since he says he has a full version of the game (surely not the FINAL version, but still much more than the demo).

If this ISN'T in his full version, I hope Creative Assembly is made aware of this before they finalize the game:

1 - Siege weapon teams should be able to fill in other siege weapon teams when they are low on men, especially if one team has used up their ammo and is just standing around with nothing better to do.

2 - Allow catapults to be re-packed, moved, and un-packed at a new location.

Sir Kuma of The Org

07-03-2002, 06:01

Quote Originally posted by JRock:
Yes it would really be nice to hear from Darkmoor Dragon since he says he has a full version of the game (surely not the FINAL version, but still much more than the demo).

If this ISN'T in his full version, I hope Creative Assembly is made aware of this before they finalize the game:

1 - Siege weapon teams should be able to fill in other siege weapon teams when they are low on men, especially if one team has used up their ammo and is just standing around with nothing better to do.

2 - Allow catapults to be re-packed, moved, and un-packed at a new location.[/QUOTE]

Rumour has it that they are lurking around the com and the org reading some posts. But is it to late to change stuff? I don't know.

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La vie est un don.

JRock

07-03-2002, 06:17

If the release date is August 23rd, heck if the game hasn't gone gold (which will happen a couple weeks before it reaches stores) it's not too late to fix/edit things.

theforce

07-03-2002, 06:23

I don't mind if they delay a bit. I just want it to be as good as it can be.

------------------
I cannot return l presume so l will keep my name among those who are dead by bows!
http://www.dedicatedgaming.com/~angelsofdarkness

Khan7

07-03-2002, 12:29

Ok, yes, technically I'm sure some of the smaller pieces should be moveable after the start of the battle. But FOR REAL-- first of all, it was simply not done this way. Second of all, they would have to move very slowly, and take a good bit of time to limber up, and to reemplace, etc. etc. This is really a STRATEGIC aspect. I don't really feel there is a place in the MTW tactical mode for this kind of thing.. you'd have to keep track of horses and carts, add whole new movement phases for the limbering and emplacing, make certain types of terrain impassable, etc. etc. etc.

And plus you're going to be sitting there for 15 minutes minimum waiting for the little dinky-rink mini-catapault to move...

I mean if you want to get right down to it, I don't believe that before the advent of gunpowder there was anyone but the Mongols who were really using their artillery in a tactical fashion. And then when it did get to be used in this way, yes, there was artillery maneuvering, but this would be occuring before the battle.

If one were to add movement of artillery to the tactical portion of the game, it would simply add a great deal of waiting around, and require very significant additions to the game engine.

I think they made the right choice here.

Matt

Hirosito

07-03-2002, 20:28

agreed and this is not essential in any way.

TosaInu

07-03-2002, 20:48

Konnichiwa,

Movable catapults might be the only way to conquer huge citadels.

Is this realistic?

Attack a large citadel, siege engines destroy all outer walls, but the inner sections are just out of range. You come back the season after it (which I hope is not a full year as some screenshots suggested) and you'll deploy the engines closer to hit down the inner walls. But 1 turn elapsed and all those walls are (automatically) rebuild again.

An inmobile light wooden construction with wheels and a 10 men crew is very unrealistic to me. 50% of the infantrywalkspeed is slow.

------------------
Ja mata
Toda MizuTosaInu
Daimyo Takiyama Shi

http://www.takiyama.cjb.net

Emp. Conralius

07-04-2002, 00:02

Very true...

Emp. Conralius

07-04-2002, 00:04

If you can't move your artillery when sieging a great big citadel, like Constantinople, heavy casualties are to be expected.

Orda Khan

07-04-2002, 01:36

To number a unit select ctrl+shift+#
To select that unit after it is numbered select ctrl+#
.........Orda

Emp. Conralius

07-04-2002, 01:50

I think the game physics work graet, even in the demo. After downloading the Hundred Years War Mod, I awaited the French attack. Then, with plenty of open terrain they charged at me, I figured that a solid human chain of Feudal Men-at-Arms and Feadal Sergeants would surely stop the Gothic Knight's charge (they had maces), but, believe it or not, the momentum built up by the French totally broke through my lines! Only my sergeants could put up a descent fight!

JRock

07-04-2002, 05:04

Celtiberos Shimazu

07-04-2002, 05:54

I think that rout unit should be in another place (perhaps to 50 miles away). In that position could be easy make a fatal mistake.

theforce

07-04-2002, 06:15

Smaller units should be able to move again but very slowly but bigger siege engines would take too much time.

------------------
I cannot return l presume so l will keep my name among those who are dead by bows!
http://www.dedicatedgaming.com/~angelsofdarkness

Emp. Conralius

07-04-2002, 06:31

Catpults had wheels, but mangonels and trebuchets hadto be built on the field, they ain't movin. I the demo you can even see the catapults having wheels, whats up with that!?

Khan7

07-04-2002, 19:54

Quote Originally posted by TosaInu:
Konnichiwa,

Movable catapults might be the only way to conquer huge citadels.

Is this realistic?

Attack a large citadel, siege engines destroy all outer walls, but the inner sections are just out of range. You come back the season after it (which I hope is not a full year as some screenshots suggested) and you'll deploy the engines closer to hit down the inner walls. But 1 turn elapsed and all those walls are (automatically) rebuild again.

An inmobile light wooden construction with wheels and a 10 men crew is very unrealistic to me. 50% of the infantrywalkspeed is slow.

[/QUOTE]

You might have a point, except..

REALISTICALLY.. any pieces small enough to be mobile would be useless in attacking the walls of a large citadel anyway.

Which means mobile artillery is still, IMO, a pain in the ass which would not be worth adding.

Also, BTW, the sources I have looked at have pointed to carts and horses being the methods for transporting such small pieces. If you will look at the unit descriptions, it clearly states that the wheels on the catapaults are there to absorb the recoil of firing so that the thing doesn't break in two every time it is fired. They are not for mobility.. even if you hooked up a team of oxen, I cannot imagine that being a very efficient way to move them. You could be stopped by a medium-sized rock in your way.

Matt

oZoNeLaYeR

07-04-2002, 21:14

So the last resort to bring the inner wall down is too bring as many man u could... lots of patience and no time limit... and coffee.

or give some times to the walls to be fixed such as 8 seasons(Outer wall Completely Destroyed) 4 seasons if the wall is partially destroyed. and to prevent them to completely fixed the wall, we have to attack the castle in the time frame given...

just my 2 cents... xcuse me... can u spare me a change...

[This message has been edited by oZoNeLaYeR (edited 07-04-2002).]

TosaInu

07-04-2002, 21:18

Konnichiwa,

There's a difference between transporting and moving.

------------------
Ja mata
Toda MizuTosaInu
Daimyo Takiyama Shi

http://www.takiyama.cjb.net

JRock

07-05-2002, 11:42

If these things are so immobile then how do you explain being able to select targets for them AT ALL? Technically if they're immobile, they can't be aimed left or right.

Just stop making excuses for something that should be fixed. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/tongue.gif

Nelson

07-05-2002, 20:22

Some engines could pivot somewhat. Others couldn't budge.

theforce

07-05-2002, 21:22

Even in the recent World Wars artillery like the Cannon of Paris and other huge artillery shows us how immobily these things could be.
Imagine with the technology of those ages :P
I like the idea of stationary artillery(speaking about bigger artillery) since the ability to move would make attackers destory all defenders before they breach the walls. Smaller units should be able to move around but very slowly.

------------------
I cannot return l presume so l will keep my name among those who are dead by bows!
http://www.dedicatedgaming.com/~angelsofdarkness

Khan7

07-05-2002, 22:20

Well, if the developers are trying for any degree of realism, the walls will not be rebuilt between turns.

I mean, think about it. If you are surrounded, cut off, and under constant threat of attack, how the hell are you even going to get the necessary materials to make more than superficial repairs? Nevermind the free time and space to set up and finish the work.

Matt

theforce

07-05-2002, 22:25

I think there should be a script that measures the demage on the walls and tells how much money and time it will require for the walls to get fixed!

------------------
I cannot return l presume so l will keep my name among those who are dead by bows!
http://www.dedicatedgaming.com/~angelsofdarkness

Khan7

07-05-2002, 22:30

But you shouldn't be able to fix them at all when under siege!

TosaInu

07-06-2002, 00:02

Konnichiwa,

Many types of siege engines exist, some of them will be found back in MTW, not all: battering rams, siege towers, miners, scaling ladders, large mobile/static/portable shields, stormcats.

I'am a fan too, I 'always' want more and I like things to be as realistic as possible.

MTW will be able to do many things, have you seen the systemspecs? And do you remember the specs for STW? What would the minimum specs be if MTW will (also) similate every realistic aspect of a medieval siege?
And would MTW ever hit the store?
Who would actually have the time to complete one siege? A siege of a full month isn't rare: that's 720 hours. Let's be fair, would a siegebattle of 30 minutes be realistic?

And if you did complete a siege, would there be time left to play any other aspect of the game?
Should those aspects be 100% realistic too?
Should I wait 18 human years (some 157,000 hours) from the day my daughter is born till I can marry her to 1 of my generals?

MTW is a simulation of authentic history, therefore it must be realistic, but it's also a game, and one that should preferrably be released during this life too. Be playable on current hardware, supported. And enjoyable for a wide audience... and fair and balanced, bugfree...not boring...not too expensive................

I'm for realism, but also for all those other things (whether I like it or not), and they are not always compatible with each other.

Only looking at realism will totally wreck all those other things.

A siegebattle in MTW of some 30 minutes would easily represent a full week. No I don't want the walkspeed of the units adjusted to that (don't we have something that isn't 100% realistic here?).

An immobile siegeweapon could be repositioned several times in that week. I just can't imagine that an army dragged a siegecannon all the way from Cambridge to Northhampton, knock down a section of the wall, discover that another section has to be knocked down and say: 'This cannon is immobile, let's go back home to get another siege cannon'.

A large piece should have some rotation freedom, something which is already the case with trebuchets (I'm sure those could not pivot in the way intended here).

100% realism is not achievable, I'ld go for this compromise:

Large and heavy equipment like siegecannons and trebuchets can't be moved, but can be pivotted 30 degrees left and right from the current position. A trebuchet already does this (I experimented a bit with the adf file)
It can shoot forward at an angle of about 20-30 degrees left and right (something a trebuchet likely can't), but a trebuchet that's faced 180 degrees in the other direction can't shoot the wall at all.

Anything that's not heavy or has wheels (a catapult is/has both) should be moveable, very slowly though.

I just saw something that I hadn't noticed before: catapults can't move but they can rotate. This allows to enhance realism of the just suggested compromise, as the turning speed is a stat value that can be unique for each weapon/unit.

You could assign the rotating to the immobile siege engines (limited to the 30 degrees as mentioned before or allow 360 degrees rotation). The rigid and very heavy engines could be given a very slow rotation, making it nasty to reposition them as should. The heavy engines (including those with an internal pivot mechanism) a faster turning speed. This uncouples the normal reload from repositioning (STW suffered from knit together events).

If you look at the unitstatfile, you'll see that the balista, catapult, trebuchet and mangonel all have their own missiletype (similair like STW Projectile.txt with arqs and muskets). I haven't found the missiledescriptions yet (perhaps not present in the demo), but I'm fairly sure that it's similair like STW's one but with a lot more. A cunning observer might have noticed that it then probably has variables for turning and an internal pivot for each unit (catapults turn, trebuchets don't but can pivot). It may already be present, but what's needed is a forward speed (we/some of us, want catapults to move at 50% of infantry speed).

So far (STW WE/MI), each unit could use a parameter, whether it was relevant for that unit or not. So if you want you could give trebuchets the speed of a running horse, or make them static and unpivottable.

Conclusion: this makes the entire discussion about what should move and what not, from the perspective of the game MTW, totally unnecessary, as anyone could adjust the values of these parameters him/herself.

That's how software should be made, cheers CA.

------------------
Ja mata
Toda MizuTosaInu
Daimyo Takiyama Shi

http://www.takiyama.cjb.net

theforce

07-06-2002, 00:14

You are missing the point.
Sieges should be like that. Taking the castle in real time would take more time than now.
Like u siege a castle. Each season u make one attack while during that season the siege engines are probably working and men die in the castle!

------------------
I cannot return l presume so l will keep my name among those who are dead by bows!
http://www.dedicatedgaming.com/~angelsofdarkness

JRock

07-06-2002, 00:15

Why do you guys always bring up "length of time" arguments when people talk about realism? That's such a strawman argument. NO ONE is arguing the sieges should take place in real time and actually take the player a couple years to perform.

"Realistic" ALWAYS PERTAINS TO THE GAME'S TIME SCALE, NOT THE SCALE OF TIME IN REALITY. There is a huge difference between "making a game based on Medieval warfare realistic to its topic" and "reality". Learn to differentiate the two.

No wargame or RTS game, no matter how realistic, takes time at a 1:1 scale with reality.

Stop basing your anti-realism lazy argument on "length of time in reality" and try actually attempting to argue against CA allowing catapults to be slowly moved in a realistic manner (realistic in the game's time scale), which you can't because there is no valid reason for them not to fix things like that.

Further, when discussing the "realism" of this game, if you are NOT going to allow a catapult or any siege equipment to be moved at all, then explain how the player is able to aim them to the left or right if they are stationary devices. It is physically impossible. This is why siege equipment like trebuchets and mangonels have such a large payload - they can only aim distance, not left or right (I think that's called azimuth?) so they want to do as much damage as possible to anything in line with them.

I don't understand the mentality of arguing against CA making changes, fixes, and additions when they are to IMPROVE the game.

You pull these extraneous arguments out of your ass about "but then sieges would take years!". No they wouldn't, the scale of time doesn't suddenly change because you allow catapults to be moveable. What kind of claim is that?!

Quote 100% realism is not achievable, I'ld go for this compromise:

Large and heavy equipment like siegecannons and trebuchets can't be moved, but can be pivotted 30 degrees left and right from the current position. A trebuchet already does this (I experimented a bit with the adf file)
It can shoot forward at an angle of about 20-30 degrees left and right (something a trebuchet likely can't), but a trebuchet that's faced 180 degrees in the other direction can't shoot the wall at all.

Anything that's not heavy or has wheels (a catapult is/has both) should be moveable, very slowly though.

I just saw something that I hadn't noticed before: catapults can't move but they can rotate. This allows to enhance realism of the just suggested compromise, as the turning speed is a stat value that can be unique for each weapon/unit.

You could assign the rotating to the immobile siege engines (limited to the 30 degrees as mentioned before or allow 360 degrees rotation). The rigid and very heavy engines could be given a very slow rotation, making it nasty to reposition them as should. The heavy engines (including those with an internal pivot mechanism) a faster turning speed. This uncouples the normal reload from repositioning (STW suffered from knit together events).

If you look at the unitstatfile, you'll see that the balista, catapult, trebuchet and mangonel all have their own missiletype (similair like STW Projectile.txt with arqs and muskets). I haven't found the missiledescriptions yet (perhaps not present in the demo), but I'm fairly sure that it's similair like STW's one but with a lot more. A cunning observer might have noticed that it then probably has variables for turning and an internal pivot for each unit (catapults turn, trebuchets don't but can pivot). It may already be present, but what's needed is a forward speed (we/some of us, want catapults to move at 50% of infantry speed).
[/QUOTE]

YES. That is all. Nothing else. None of this "but then..." anything. There is no EFFECT to making the catapult slowly moveable unless the programmer programs one. There is no sudden "OMG SIEGES NOW TAKE TWO YEARS TO PLAY BECAUSE THE CATAPULT CAN MOVE."

No, you just scale in the catapult movement to the game's time scale. 50% infantry walk speed is slow enough. Done. Simple.

Quote anyone could adjust the values of these parameters him/herself.
[/QUOTE]

Errr, no you can't. If you do that and try to play online, the game with either not allow it because your file is not pure, or it would just crash because of the code discrepancies between the players.

They should just code it in and the few who don't like it can go ahead and change it back to non-moving and enjoy their own little version of the game with two year sieges or whatever imaginary problems they can create.

[This message has been edited by JRock (edited 07-05-2002).]

[This message has been edited by JRock (edited 07-05-2002).]

[This message has been edited by Sir Kuma of The Org (edited 07-05-2002).]

[This message has been edited by Sir Kuma of The Org (edited 07-05-2002).]

TosaInu

07-06-2002, 00:45

Konnichiwa,

Thanks for reading JSRock san. I'm not sure whether my posts is clear, and as you may have noticed, the intended content changed a bit too while I compiled it. It may be quite confusing.

Not sure whether your first comments were due to my post, but I did not state that if siege engines were mobile that a siege would last two years. What I tried to say was, that the sieges never can be 100% realistic (30 mins vs a full day and up). And that the aim for a 100% realistic game will wreck all other prequisites for a game.

Furthermore, stats can be different. Of course, each player in 1 online game must have the same stats, but nothing prevents that player A & B use stat Y in game 1 and player C & D stat Z in game 2. Apart from that, many people only or also play this game offline. Something similair is already going on in STW, online and offline: 1.01, 1.02, 1.03 and more.

Edit: anyone seems to have ideas and arguments on how things should work. Point is that this is likely not relevant at all. CA will release a game, and anyone can modify it to his/her liking: more towards realism (which???) or more towards an ('arcade') game.

Edit 2: TheForce san, a nice, valid and realistic idea, but siege battles are supposed to work online too. You play one continuous battle there.

Khan7, are you really suggesting that noone will be able to see those cool engines in real time anymore?

Attacking a castle, not laying siege and starve them out, took days or weeks. What I tried to point out, is that a tiny concession to realism (moveable catapults, though I'm convinced they are) in favour of playability, isn't a crime, as this game already isn't 100% realistic and will never be (timelines).

Let me put it in other words: the question should not be: what is the truth, but what would be needed to make this game enjoyable for us?

A new point is raised here (yours and TheForces). Immobile siege engines, you could choose to make the trebs unpivottable as well, knock down some outer walls and stop the attack. But unlike STW, stopping the attack should not lift the siege. You can continue, with repositioned engines, in the next turn. Thus a castleassault could take multiple turns. Of course walls should not be repaired while the castle is under siege.

All of this is optional, and should serve the needs of all.

------------------
Ja mata
Toda MizuTosaInu
Daimyo Takiyama Shi
http://www.takiyama.cjb.net

[This message has been edited by TosaInu (edited 07-05-2002).]

[This message has been edited by TosaInu (edited 07-05-2002).]

Khan7

07-06-2002, 00:52

Well, if walls can't be rebuilt during a siege, then it WOULD actually make some sense to march onto the battlefield, knock down a few walls, be unable to go further, and then have to retreat and try again next turn, positioning your engines closer to knock down the next wall.

Frankly tho it would make much more sense to do away with knocking down walls as a tactical event and make it strategic, in the same way a certain number of the garrison die each turn in a siege. But that's another thread.

And, TosaSan, tho you have a good logical argument with the proportional time thing.. it has a hole or two IMO. For instance, the rate of combat, the rate of troop movement, is not proportional to a much longer time frame. At most, it is proportional to one day. Given one whole day, one could reposition a smaller siege engine and get off a few shots from each position three or four times. The larger engines would be totally immobile, however, in that timeframe.. they had to be built where they were. Same with large siegecannon.. the very largest of these would take two days just to emplace, and could only fire a few rounds per day.

Anyway, just some thoughts. However, if we are to consider siege engines as a purely tactical feature and make their timeframes proportional to those for the other units, it is still my opinion that they must be immobile after the start of battle. At least the engines I've heard of so far-- historically there were various types of small artillery, worthless for knocking down walls, which were designed to be somewhat mobile, though only the smallest of these could be moved easily.

Matt

JRock

07-06-2002, 01:11

Quote What I tried to say was, that the sieges never can be 100% realistic (30 mins vs a full day and up). And that the aim for a 100% realistic game will wreck all other prequisites for a game.
[/QUOTE]

I agree, and no the first part of my post was not directed at you.

Quote Well, if walls can't be rebuilt during a siege, then it WOULD actually make some sense to march onto the battlefield, knock down a few walls, be unable to go further, and then have to retreat and try again next turn, positioning your engines closer to knock down the next wall.[/QUOTE]

Perhaps CA should either:

*Add an option to play the game without time limits on the real-time battles (thus solving the problem)

OR

*Remove the walls being rebuilt between turns if the castle is under siege (this solving the problem)

See, the solution to the problem is quite easy, it just requires a willing programmer at CA to fix it. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif

Quote Frankly tho it would make much more sense to do away with knocking down walls as a tactical event and make it strategic, in the same way a certain number of the garrison die each turn in a siege. [/QUOTE]

After the two suggestions I just offered, it seems more logical for them to remove the wall damage in the strategic component and make it purely tactical, since with either solution the problem is solved.

As I said earlier, I enjoy the tactical portion of the game a great deal, and seeing siege weapons removed from it would totally ruin it. Not to mention they spent all the time putting them in so I doubt they would just delete them from the game when the two solutions I listed above are much more cost-effective and simpler to implement.

[This message has been edited by JRock (edited 07-05-2002).]

Nelson

07-06-2002, 01:21

The battle clock in Shogun is optional now. Medieval will have an optional clock too I would think.

theforce

07-06-2002, 01:25

JRock l know what l am talking about.
They must work something more realistic out.
Making guesses and assumptions that battle that takes roughly 30 mins is months is just stupid.
And the statement that too much realism can hurt a game, well that is correct when realism takes away fun which can be avoided by smart developers.
I don't want something like this...
Oh lookie l have a huge army in this area and look there, there is a huge castle in the next province.
Lets attack!
...
I am there!!! Now lemme destroy the walls.
Places 5 artillery that in 5-10 minuts destory
the walls and then storms in and takes the castle.

In addition the castles are gonna many men in them, but that's it. An attacker with huge reserves would bring more and more men at the same day on month or whatever you wanna call it.

Another suggestion would be that units that don't fit in the castle walls should be out. Some might be so much to put up a good fight.

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I cannot return l presume so l will keep my name among those who are dead by bows!
http://www.dedicatedgaming.com/~angelsofdarkness

JRock

07-06-2002, 01:32

Quote They must work something more realistic out. [/QUOTE]

Why? What matters in this case is what works and is enjoyable.

Quote
Making guesses and assumptions that battle that takes roughly 30 mins is months is just stupid.
[/QUOTE]

Why? What I said two posts ago was STOP thinking in terms of "reality" timescale when you play the tactical part of the game. The strategy section uses a reality timescale but the tactical aspect CANNOT use the same timescale. It's physically impossbile.

The tactical real-time section of the game does not have a time scale the way the strategy part does, it just has a timer if you enable it so the game doesn't take too long if you don't want it to.

Did you never play Shogun? Or the old Lord of the Realms games? The real-time action is there so you can actually play the battle instead of just having the software "roll dice" to determine the outcome of battles like a traditional wargame.
But in adding a real-time component you have to have two separate things - the turn-based, reality-time-scaled strategy section, and the real-time tactical section where you fight the battles. If you are arguing that we should have the reality-time-scale in the tactical section, but that it would take too long so it's not worth it, you're essentially arguing that the game should just be a turn-based wargame. The whole point of S:TW and M:TW is to combine the two aspects into one game. This is only possible through a break in the time-scale between the strategy and tactical parts of the game.

Perhaps you need to work on your "suspension of disbelief" when you play the tactical aspect. Would it help if they added in a Sun to the tactical game arena, and it flew across the sky really fast every few seconds, to help show the passage of time?

Or, as I suggested, since the timescale of the tactical section is so bothersome to you, just have the computer auto-conclude the battles for you and pretend it took some months. The strategy board-game time will advance a couple months and you will be happy.

[This message has been edited by JRock (edited 07-05-2002).]

theforce

07-06-2002, 01:43

Hehe, Only a few times l used the AI to fight a battle for me http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/tongue.gif
Anyway you have your opinion for the matter and l have mine.
Anyway we shall see what the developers will do in the near future!

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I cannot return l presume so l will keep my name among those who are dead by bows!
http://www.dedicatedgaming.com/~angelsofdarkness

JRock

07-06-2002, 01:50

Quote Originally posted by theforce:

Anyway you have your opinion for the matter and l have mine.
[/QUOTE]

Which is all well-and-good except that what you are arguing is going against the very basis of what the Total War games are - a composite of both turn-based strategy and real-time combat. The two cannot be combined into the same time scale, which is what would satisfy you, unless you do one of the following:

*Slow down the real-time combat to a "reality" timescale. Everything moves at the speed it moves in the real world and sieges take months to play through. Physically unrealistic.

*Each turn in the turn-based section passes one minute of time. It would take forever to play. Again, physically unrealistic.

CA knows this, and that is why they combined the tactics and strategy in the way they did : turn-based where each turn is a month (or whatever it is), and the tactical aspect where it is real-time strategy combat in at a speed that is useful and familiar to anyone who has played other RTS games. The decision at the end of the tactical battle is what matters to the strategy portion of the game, they are just giving you the fun and excitement of actually playing the battle yourself and if you play well, you win instead of having dice decide it all for you like in a wargame.

What you wish for is impossible without making one aspect of the game drag on forever or by doing something that ruins one aspect of the game (like taking siege weapons out of the tactical aspect of the game) and goes against the very basis of what the Total War games are trying to do.

I found Shogun to be the perfect balance of turn-based and real-time, just as I do for Medieval.

If they just simply did not allow walls to be magically rebuilt between consecutive siege turns if the castle is under siege (which is highly realistic, so you should like that), it would solve the problem in a way because you could start the real-time siege one turn, the turn ends, and then the next turn you can continue it. At the end of the turn as long as both sides still have units left the siege is considered In Progress, instead of giving a decision for one side or the other. You can feel the battle takes time and just imagine you, the general were away for 29 days and now have returned to see how the siege is going.

Pretty easy solution that works.

[This message has been edited by JRock (edited 07-05-2002).]

theforce

07-06-2002, 02:23

Again u don't get my point. U should read my reply to Khan7 topic.

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I cannot return l presume so l will keep my name among those who are dead by bows!
http://www.dedicatedgaming.com/~angelsofdarkness

Darkmoor_Dragon

07-06-2002, 04:14

NB: Whena ttacking a province with a castle you dont attack the castle directly - that has to come on the next move.

So if troops withdraw to the castle (a seperate option to withdraw from the province) its on the net move that you get the chance toa ssault it directly.

This lets the AI bring in more troops and raise the seige (Well in this instance the seige isnt actually started but its the same thing in effect)

Ah yea - if you go in knock down some walls - then withdraw - you remain beseiging the castle in the campaign map and in "sort of control" of the province (though you cant build and gt no taxes). Howevver, the castle is "automatically" rebuilt no matter what damage you did to it.

[This message has been edited by Darkmoor_Dragon (edited 07-05-2002).]

Darkmoor_Dragon

07-06-2002, 04:28

PS - Im waitng for a response on the question concerning seige engines wtih ammo and no troops - combining with seige engines with ammo and no troops.

I have the feeling its a limitation we're going to have to live with though..but ya never know.

I guess it raises the theme for any and all like-units, if i have 20 longbows here and 20 longbows there why also cant i merge them "in batle game" rather than waiting for the campaign move.

What's tricky about it? I guess valour levels, which unit leader takes precedence and commands, that sort of stuff. All this is handled in the campaign section though so...

It does make sense so long as the units are like-for-like.

(NB - infact, thinking about it, when engines are asaulted the crew run away - but come back if the enemy is beaten away and the engine is still useable. you can also move the men away from the engine yourself - so i guess there's only a flag that indicates which engine they are assigned to. If so even without merge you could move a full complement to another engine that was depleted... hmmm)

vyanvotts

07-06-2002, 05:21

i totally agree with JROCK i think that mtw seiges are good enough as they are, only minour things should be fixed such as being able to move catapults ect, none of this " oh seiges should be longer" crap there is a difference between boringness and gameplay..i prefer the latter

JRock

07-06-2002, 08:45

Quote Originally posted by Darkmoor_Dragon:
lots of stuff)[/QUOTE]

This is all very welcome news! Thank you for the info. I hope they do address the "troops manning siege weapons" issue I have brought up, but other than that I have to say I am very satisfied with the way the game is shaping up. I realize I have mostly posted about things I hope are fixed or changed, but that is because the game is not out yet and now is the time to be heard and get things fixed or changed.

Overall I am VERY much looking forward to this game!

TosaInu

07-06-2002, 21:35

Konnchiwa,

This post is in reply to various bits scattered all over the forum, so it might be hard to understand for people who didn't keep up with the discussion: my apologies.

Some suggested that a large citadel shouldn't be captured in one battle due to some realism and immobility of siege engines.
I don't know how long 1 turn in MTW will represent, but it will be something similair like the 3 months/turn in STW, a somewhat realistic time to assault a castle (a 100% effort to take it now, you might siege it for some 2 strategic turns first to weaken the defenders representing another 6 months).

The idea was to disable the automatic repair of destroyed castlewalls, thus allowing the deploy siege engines closer in the next turn and knock down the inner sections -ihmo the timecompressions highly contributes to non realism, so high that another tiny compromise can't make it 'any' worse: slowly moving engines. Why can an engine be moved in in 1 second just before the 2nd season starts and not during the 3 months the realtime battle could last? We're also only talking about making the light and wheeled engines mobile at 50% of infantryspeed. And the heavy 30 degrees pivottable left and right (which is already effectively the case
in MTW and looks unrealistic as well).

The suggestion that walls shouldn't be repaired in 1 turn while the castle is still under siege, makes it required that the map at the moment you leave the field must be saved. MTW will have 400 maps, realism would require that you can make castles in any of this 400 regions, but I guess that's already scaled down to just the number of provinces. That would still leave some 50 maps. When you save the game, the save should also include updates of castlemaps for all 50 provinces. 1 saved game can than easily be 10 mb, that's only the extra because of adding 1 more realistic feature. Consider the problems with more than 1 save, and mind that updated maps should also be stored in a temporary map in case you're going to save.

Not impossible to do, but it seems like a lot of work for a small problem.

Another argument aginst this system that claims to be realistic: I'll only be able to move a catapult once in 3 months. I'm sure that no warlord would ever had considered a siege if this was true.

I'm not dictating how any of you should play a game, I'm only saying that this attempt to gain more realism won't enhance realism, but seems to require a huge modification of code. While the solution of slow moving (light and wheeled) engines makes realism hardly worse (on the contrary ihmo) and requires no/hardly any modification of code.

I for one would be happy with updated maps, I'ld also like the option to make 1 turn 1 month: more realistic :-).

------------------
Ja mata
Toda MizuTosaInu
Daimyo Takiyama Shi

http://www.takiyama.cjb.net

Darkmoor_Dragon

07-07-2002, 03:06

1 turn = 1 year

castles are considered repaired after an unsuccesful assault.

JRock

07-07-2002, 03:34

Quote Originally posted by Khan7:
Well, if walls can't be rebuilt during a siege, then it WOULD actually make some sense to march onto the battlefield, knock down a few walls, be unable to go further, and then have to retreat and try again next turn, positioning your engines closer to knock down the next wall.[/QUOTE]

EXACTLY.

IMHO, there's a lot less fun in the game when you can't bust down the walls yourself. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif

JRock

07-07-2002, 03:41

Quote Originally posted by TosaInu:
That would still leave some 50 maps. When you save the game, the save should also include updates of castlemaps for all 50 provinces. 1 saved game can than easily be 10 mb, that's only the extra because of adding 1 more realistic feature.[/QUOTE]

You plan on commencing 50 sieges at once?
I'd say it's more realistic to expect maybe 3-5 sieges at one time at the most, so that would be only 10% of the 10MB... that would be around 1MB in size then, yes? Not a big save-game file at all. Besides, does it really matter how large the savegame file is (within reason)? Not really. Anything under 10MB for the max size of a savegame file isn't an unreasonable size in these days of 100GB harddrives and 512MB-1GB of RAM.

JRock

07-07-2002, 03:42

Quote Originally posted by Darkmoor_Dragon:
castles are considered repaired after an unsuccesful assault.[/QUOTE]

Right, and I think that's what some of us are hoping will be changed. Simply make it so that the walls are not repaired if the enemy army is still in the terroritory and sieging the castle.

TosaInu

07-07-2002, 05:12

50 sieges is 'worst' case: AI armies could siege too.

1 year a turn, now that's sad.

TosaInu

07-07-2002, 16:35

Konnichiwa JSRock san,

Part of the customers may not be pleased by 10 mb saves. I do agree that a nifty system may make an update of only those maps that actually need an update (resulting in indeed an extra 1 mb or even less). It may even be possible to include a small description about the state of a castle (as that is the only part of the map that changes) and use that and the actual default map to compile a new map on the fly. Furthermore: an updated TGA file is not necessary. 3 updated maps could be 300 kb. Point is that it seems to take some time to implement it.

I'm all for it, but is it realistic to expect it to happen (in the 1st release)? The PC gamer preview of June talked about MTW having a more modular system than STW, allowing to add stuff. But is this something that can be added in the design?

1 turn a year is like a sight seeing tour through London by bus at 200 mph. I already thought (personally) that 1 turn/3 months like STW did, was way too fast. I'ld like to have that user definable too: 1-12 months.
I like to stick with a certain period. Ceasar used a sort of accelerated real time of 365 days. I don't want to develop a bow to find out 1 hour later that's obsolete because of gunpowder.

Producing units and buildings is described in turns, thus a user can choose to make training a unit 6 months and have 1 month turns. You get a clear distinction between long term and short term strategy. You'll get 3 turns of reasonable weather in the summer to attack, then 3 average in autumn and 3 bad in winter to consolidate. Right now each turn is 'similair' (that's unacceptable unrealistic to me).

------------------
Ja mata
Toda MizuTosaInu
Daimyo Takiyama Shi

http://www.takiyama.cjb.net